He grew up watching the haka, chasing his brothers around rugby fields, and dreaming of pulling on the All Blacks jersey someday. But Katene Clarke, proud of his Maori heritage and shaped by a family steeped in rugby, found his calling with a cricket bat instead.
New Zealand’s Clarke has quickly built a reputation as a powerful striker of the ball, particularly against spin, after two standout domestic seasons and three Super Smash titles with the Braves. Drawing comparisons to the likes of Finn Allen and Tim Seifert for his aggressive T20 approach, Clarke made an instant impact at international level with a maiden T20I fifty against Bangladesh. In an exclusive interview with Times of Bangladesh, the Maori-heritage batter opens up on his mindset, batting philosophy, and the life-changing decision that shaped his cricket journey.
You smashed the Bangladeshi bowlers in the series opener, particularly the spinners. Batters from SENA regions usually find spin challenging in these conditions, but you looked completely at ease. what’s your secret?
I’ve done a lot of work over the past couple of years with the likes of BJ Watling and Daniel Flynn to develop my spin game in New Zealand conditions first, then once I found out about this tour, trying to get all the tools that they had from their experiences playing in the sub-continent.
Trying to take those on board and use them in my arsenal against whoever I come across over here. They’ve been instrumental in developing my game towards that, and yeah, just about having the confidence to go out there and do it on the field.
You’ve burst onto the scene through T20 cricket. How do you see the format evolving nowadays? And after your consistent performances in the Super Smash, striking at over 150 across seasons, how has your approach kept pace with that evolution?
It’s definitely a higher pace than it used to be. It’s definitely more volatile. Batters are ready to go from ball one and also ready to adapt if it doesn’t pay off in the first two or three overs. It’s just a very aggressive, volatile game at the moment and batters are genuinely looking to score that 250 or definitely over 200. 200 feels like the par score no matter where you play. Big scores and high strike rates are where it’s at the moment and hopefully it continues, but we’ll see where we go from there.
Coming from a strong rugby background in your family, it’s interesting that you and your brother Tamati chose cricket. How did you both get into the game
I think just my mom and dad were always sporty athletes growing up and tried all sorts of sports. I’m not too sure exactly how they got Tamati into the cricket stuff, but he’s the eldest. He’s nine and a half years older than me. I think he just took it on board and he loved it and was obviously naturally quite good at it. All my brothers played while they were growing up and while I was growing up I got to spend a lot of time on the sideline watching them and being around the sport. That’s definitely how I got into it, being around it and watching it growing up and being around the team environment.
In a rugby-obsessed country like New Zealand, choosing a different path isn’t always easy. How challenging was it for you to move away from rugby and pursue cricket instead?
It sort of happened pretty organically, pretty naturally. Always grew up wanting to play rugby and obviously my old man and uncle and their dad played at a high level. Brothers played. It was always a dream to play, but I think once you get older you realize that for me, I was further ahead in the game of cricket and probably wasn’t going to be big enough or good enough for that factor to play rugby anymore.
So it was about taking my chances when they came in cricket and being happy with that decision and just putting all the eggs in one basket and having a good crack and taking all the opportunities that come.
With rugby in your bloodline, has it helped you in cricket in any way—mentally or physically?
I’m unsure about the mental side, but definitely the physical side. Playing sport all year round when you’re growing up, you can’t really play cricket all year round. You can do some indoor stuff, but just keeping naturally fit playing two sports and doing all the trainings and just being active 24/7 definitely helped for the cricket side of things. Also being a part of a completely different sort of team environment. Rugby is a completely different team makeup and different players, different people that you connect with each other. So it was good to be around both of those.
I was scrolling through your Instagram last night and noticed you’re not very active there. But I did see a few rugby-related photos. Did you play rugby as well at some point?
I played rugby up until my last year of school. Played all through my younger days all the way up until I was selected for the Under 19s for the World Cup. Then sort of from that point on, it was sort of make a decision, you’re further ahead in cricket at the moment. It was either this or that. It’s always nice to go and watch. I still watch a lot of rugby and a lot of my mates still play rugby, so it’s good to go back and watch and be around the rugby club rooms and whatnot.
The All Blacks’ haka is such a powerful tradition rooted in Maori heritage. How do you personally relate to that cultural aspect of New Zealand rugby.
I personally not too close in terms of being able to speak it, but I’ve been around it my whole life and we’ve always tapped into it every once or twice a year. We go up North and connect with our family that’s from up there. Up in Whangarei or past Whangarei and Paihia and stuff like that. So it’s good to be around and touch base with what they’re doing and seeing how the family’s going up there.
What do you find most powerful or meaningful about the haka
I guess it’s just like a challenge. It’s starting the base off for a challenge. That aspect sort of switching your mind on and putting your head in the game for what’s to come over the next couple hours or whatever it is.
Maori cricketers have made their mark in New Zealand cricket over time. How would you describe the current pathway and opportunities for Maori players in the game?
I think just the exposure that cricketers and not just Maori people but just cricketers in general, the amount of teams and grassroots stuff that they have now, I think allows a lot more people to filter in and especially Maori people. I think they’ve just got a little bit more of an understanding of the game and how the game works at the moment.
New Zealand cricket has a growing multicultural mix, from players of Indian heritage like Ish Sodhi to long-standing figures like Ross Taylor. How do you feel this diversity is shaping the team’s identity?
I can only speak personally, I think it’s pretty easy to sort of fit in and everyone sort of welcomes you as a New Zealander and everyone’s respectful of whatever background you come from and yeah, we try to get along with each other as well as possible and sort of come together and play as one.
Coming back to cricket, you’re often compared with Finn Allen for your batting style. After his outstanding World Cup semi-final against South Africa, and given you’ve come through the same age-group system, do you look up to him or take inspiration from his game?”
Yeah, I watched the highlights, yeah. It was a bit early in the morning.
Definitely an aspiration to live the life that he’s living at the moment. He’s got a pretty good gig flying around the world and playing short format cricket and earning good money. So yeah, we’ll see how we get on over the next little bit.
Growing up, who was your batting idol in cricket?
Brendon McCullum, I’d say.
What’s your T20 batting mantra?
I don’t really have one to be honest. Just assess and adapt, I guess, to the pitch as fast as possible. I guess if we’re batting first, it’s doing that as fast as possible and if we’re chasing then getting good comms around what it’s doing and probably the good options and best options to take throughout an innings.
How does it feel to have such strong backing from your captain and selectors, who clearly rate you highly?
It’s always awesome. It’s good. It definitely motivates just trying to put the best performance on the board for the team at the time and taking every opportunity as it comes and mainly trying to perform as well as possible.
How do you look back on your journey, from switching to cricket to making it to the national team
Pretty happy from where it’s sort of started and where we’ve come to. I guess it’s happened pretty fast-paced this last year and a half or two years or even past half year. Sort of didn’t really think too far ahead and just focused on trying to put some performances out and now we’re playing for the Black Caps so it’s nice to be here and hopefully we can hang around for a long time. All good.
